Question from Fridays at 4 - 2/6/26

Aelonwy

DDO's Cosmetic Fashionista
Tolero said we'd be getting Duergar and Duergar Iconic like Svirfneblin but what we got then was Gnome and Svirfneblin Iconic. Is there a surface version of Duergar (besides regular dwarf?) where Duergar is the Underdark variety the way Svirfneblin is the underdark version of gnome? Did she mean we were getting a new variety of Dwarf with Duergar as the Iconic or just two versions of Duergar with one being Iconic? Did she give any hint what base class the Iconic would be?
 

FaceDancer

Olde Wurm
I really hope it's Duergar all of the way around (that's how I interpret the producers letter). I didn't get to see all of the stream, so I'll have to catch up on that later to see if there's any interesting nuggets dropped...
 

Gemini-Dragon

Active member
I’d assume we’d get an Eberron Duergar as a normal race and an Iconic Forgotten Realms Duergar. Seeing how the expansion is in the Forgotten Realms. The thing I didn’t understand was the discussion about the drow rework. She mentioned the wood elf variant race and the possibility of a drow variant? They didn’t mention the Iconic class. There are only 4 classes without an iconic and favored soul makes the most sense I think, out of the 4. Duergar have some racial spells and can choose their caster stat for those spells. Favored Souls use the higher of cha/wis so there is some synergy there.
 

Aelonwy

DDO's Cosmetic Fashionista
I’d assume we’d get an Eberron Duergar as a normal race and an Iconic Forgotten Realms Duergar. Seeing how the expansion is in the Forgotten Realms.
I didn't even think of that... that actually makes sense... so watch them do something else entirely. 😆

I love the idea of variant races, I just really, really want them to make sense to the lore. I don't think we'll get an iconic tied to a class that is P2P, we're still missing druid but I can't see Duergar as an Iconic Druid so they'll probably do exactly that... 😡
 

Solarpower

Well-known member
I can't see Duergar as an Iconic Druid
Duergar Druid makes even less sense then Morninglord. 😁
Besides, the Duergar make no sense in DDO as a playable race at all. In DDO, there are no "evil" alignments for the player to choose, and Duergar are never good.
 
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Leesun

Well-known member
The biggest point of interest with duergar would be psionics.

The invisibility and enlarge person abilities of duergar in Eberron are considered psionic abilities. Kieth Baker himself described Eberron duergar as "twisted deep dwarves" from ruined holds. Sarlona was entry point for the quori. The sheer number on this continent impacted the natives resulting in the continent of Sarlona producing the majority of inherent psionics. The duergar were also hired and betrayed/enslaved by the Inspired. The close proximity to psionic beings on the continent where they, the psionic beings, emerged in the largest number is what gave the duergar psionic abilities.


By contrast, in Forgotten Realms the invisibility and enlarge person are considered spell-like abilities instead of psionics, though they do stem from Illithids. In FR, illithids used surgery and eugenics to breed the duergar into being better overseers over other slaves of the illithids. The duergar would rebel against the illithids and, their eventual demigoddess Deep Dura, had surgeries performed on many captured illithids to learn the secrets of psionics, the "invisible arts", from the illithids and embedded it racially into the duergar. So even though they were psionic originally in lore, the racial embedding by the duergar demigod is largely why in FR the abilities are considered racial spell-like abilities instead of true psionics.

I bring psionics up because I think I vaguely remember many years ago devs saying that psionics would not be a part of ddo. It will be interesting to see if the anti-psionic stance has changed given that the duergar of Eberron are inherently psionic in nature and the ones of FR were heavily influenced by psionics.
 

Lagin

Well-known member
The biggest point of interest with duergar would be psionics.

The invisibility and enlarge person abilities of duergar in Eberron are considered psionic abilities. Kieth Baker himself described Eberron duergar as "twisted deep dwarves" from ruined holds. Sarlona was entry point for the quori.
Good points made. I ran Made to Order & Relic of Sov Past last night/ today & watched all those duergar enlarge when engaged.
 
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